


ease my mind

by Kavi Leighanna (kleighanna)



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: tumblr prompt fills
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-11
Packaged: 2018-04-08 19:42:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4317360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kleighanna/pseuds/Kavi%20Leighanna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>General prompt fills for CM</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_It starts innocuously enough. It’s a party at Dave’s and Emily is running late. She’s had to stop for cupcakes, gourmet cupcakes that she’s been telling JJ about for a week and a half._

_She sees Morgan first._

_There’s blood soaking his t-shirt and his head’s at an odd angle. The cupcakes tumble to the floor as she races to his side, immediately puts two fingers on his pulse._

_Right about the time she realizes he’s dead, she sees Hotch’s legs. He’s not moving either and she can already feel the tears climbing her throat as she crawls to his side._

_Dead._

_Dave’s sprawled in the living room doorway, and Reid not far from him. Penelope’s slumped in a corner, probably where she’d hidden as best she could behind Dave’s huge arm chair._

_She races through the rest of the house, searching, searching. She finds Jack last, laid out on the bed, still as an angel beside his dead mother. Haley’s taken a bullet to the head. Jack… Jack she doesn’t know._

_The first sob comes as a hiccup as she collapses to the floor. The second is a wail. She catches movement out of the corner of her eye before she can start sobbing in earnest._

_And Ian Doyle steps from the closet. He looks smug, triumphant at her tears and agony._

_“You took everything important to me,” he tells her. “Now I’m taking everything important to you.”_

She shoots up on the plane, blanket falling across her legs. Her heart is pounding and her head is splitting and-

“Hey.”

She looks down, tries to breathe through the panic and pain. Hotch is there, kneeling beside her, reaching out to rest a hand on her arm. 

“Just a nightmare.”

“Yeah,” she says, still breathless, still panting. “Just a nightmare.”

Until a few years later it kind of sort of comes true.


	2. political savvy prentiss pt 1

Her back straightens first. Her entire spine goes ramrod straight and JJ trails off mid-sentence. Her shoulders go back next, her neck lengthening… Hotch feels a bit like he’s watching an alien grow out of Emily’s skin. 

(Oh God, she is never choosing the movie again. Pop culture references, God.)

“Miss Prentiss. I must say I didn’t expect to see you here. Weren’t you in Cannes last week?”

The smile that spreads across her face is this cold, disgusting thing even as she reaches out a hand to shake. “Senator Meyer. I’m afraid my job keeps me away from Europe these days.”

JJ shifts uncomfortably next to him, but it’s something that only registers absently in his mind when he’s faced with this… pod person.

(Seriously. No more sci-fi movies. He’s going to make it a rule.)

“Hm, that’s too bad. I hear it’s beautiful this time of year. My daughter’s over there now getting some sun.”

It doesn’t take a genius to read between those lines. Emily has always been pale but Hotch is pretty sure the senator means it as ‘unhealthy’ this time. 

“I’m glad to hear it. Mother mentioned she was having a difficult time in LA. She was just in the hospital, wasn’t she?” She turns back to the team at large, that gross fake smile still in place, a completely plastic sympathy in her eyes. “Exhaustion. You know how Hollywood is.”

The senator seems to pause for a moment, a bit of a fish out of water, like he hadn’t expected this woman to play his game as well as he does. He’s not alone. The entirety of his team is looking at Emily like this is the most uncomfortable thing they’ve ever witnessed. 

(And they chase serial killers. Their version of ‘uncomfortable’ is _incredibly_  skewed.) 

“What brings you here?” she finally asks, folds her hands in front of her in the most demure posture Hotch has ever seen. It doesn’t fit her, her headstrong personality and quick competent hands. “I’m afraid this isn’t the way to the Secret Service.”

The senator is definitely going red, offended and angry that she’s totally beating him at his own game. 

“There’s a drug ring operating out of LA I want stopped. Ambassador Prentiss spoke highly of your team.”

Emily releases a little hum, considering and sympathetic in equal measure. “That’s more for the DEA unfortunately. We track serial killers.”

“This ring is responsible for a number of deaths in California.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Emily says with a certain graciousness that makes even Dave cringe. “I’m afraid it’s out of our scope.”

There’s definitely some purple on the senator’s face now, the flexing of his fingers that says he is not nearly as in control as he’d like to be. Emily seems utterly unfazed about it all and he wants to be impressed, he really does. The thing is, it is so utterly disturbing to see her so carefully polite. This is a woman who speaks her mind and hasn’t held back since discovering just what she means to this team. 

“I’m sure we can give you a name at the DEA,” she goes on to say, her gaze flicking towards Hotch. “Someone specific to talk to.”

The senator steps up into Emily’s face. She doesn’t so much as flinch. 

“Listen here you ungrateful brat. Your mother gave me  _your_  name. You will help me.”

Hotch is already shifting to stand when that placating smile drifts across Emily’s face. 

“Senator Meyer, we’re the FBI. We’re not in the business of revenge.” 

The senator sputters, literally, before he looks like he settles himself. He yanks his jacket down, straightens his tie. “Your supervisor will hear about this.”

“He already has,” Hotch finally speaks and he too can wear an utterly emotionless mask. “I stand by my agent, Senator. I can make a call to the DEA, but we are not in the business of tracking down drug dealers.”

Nor revenge, but it would be petty to point that out again when Emily had done it so eloquently. 

Dave, who has leaned casually back in his chair, a little smile on his face that does not bode well for anyone speaks up then. “I’m sure the DEA will be more than happy to hear all the information you can give them on your daughter’s drug dealer.”

The senator sputters again, but Hotch is already leading him out of the conference room and towards his office. He glances back, just once, to see Emily’s shoulders slump and a million emotions spread across her face. He acknowledges what she’d done with a nod and is so, so grateful he gets one back. 


End file.
